Been there done that.
Pat Williams wants to see a Major League Baseball team in Orlando, Florida. He has a dream and his team name reflects his desire to have a central Florida Major League Baseball team. The Orlando Dreamers. Pat Williams about three decades ago planned to bring Major League Baseball to Orlando and had former player and then Major League Baseball announcer Hawk Harrelson as one of his partners. Williams and Harrelson sung the praises of the Orlando market and had pictures of an Orlando baseball stadium but the notion went nowhere. Major League Baseball would eventually take the Miami and Denver markets in the 1991 expansion and those two areas would see Major League Baseball starting in 1993. Williams and Harrelson never really were taken seriously.
In 2019, Williams bid to bring Major League Baseball to Orlando won’t be taken very seriously either. There is no well-heeled owner who can to afford the price tag of owning a Major League expansion or relocation team. That price will be in the billions of dollars range unlike the 1991 price tag for an expansion team which was about $100 million without start up costs. Williams has no stadium plan either. At this point he is gauging to see how much interest there would be for an Orlando Major League Baseball team. Williams business plan seems to be flawed. Sports owners need three basics to be successful. Government support to build a venue, a large cable TV market and corporate support. Fans don’t matter much. Williams thinks Orlando would get three million people a year to attend games and points to the 80 million or so visitors to the area as a source for his claim. The tourists will go to baseball games. The TV market is not large and would Disney and Comcast support the team? It is a dream.
